Photoshoot Updates
The first is an earlier photo shoot for George and Max
The Second is a 2003 photo shoot with Catherine Zeta Jones promoting Intolerable Cruelty.
On the move: George Clooney
July 7, 2008 by admin
Filed under General Articles
Each day, when he’s working in Los Angeles, George Clooney squeezes himself into a goldfish bowl on wheels and braces himself for the pointing and stares that accompany his morning drive to the film studio. He could easily be in a car with privacy glass. He could be riding a Harley-Davidson and wearing a helmet to hide his identity. Instead he chooses to drive a car that is as unprotected from prying eyes as it is weird looking. Why does he do it? Because he believes the Tango, his electric one-seat-er, is the car of the future.
“It can be embarrassing,” he says. “There’s nowhere to hide, because it’s just me behind the wheel and there isn’t enough space for anyone else.
“But it goes from zero to 60mph in four seconds, which is faster than virtually every other car on the road, so I can take off with a burst of speed if I get too many insults.”
Whatever you think of his £45,000 British-built car, you have to admire Clooney for embracing a vehicle that’s all-electric rather than jumping on the petrol-electric hybrid Toyota Prius band-wagon like the rest of Hollywood.
“We are going to have to find a way to get away from oil,” he reasons. “It has to start with someone, somewhere, changing policy. I try and be photographed in the Tango and hope that someone thinks it’s a good idea.”
Clooney is serious about the oil issue but he has the intelligence to see the hypocrisy of globetrotting celebrities trying to preach clean living. How did he travel to the Venice film festival where we meet, for example?
“Private jet,” he says openly. “I know . . . I know. I can’t be a spokesman for the environment, because of things like that. Anyone can ask, ‘So how was the jet ride over?’ I don’t think electric cars are going to save the world, but at least it’s a start.”
Clooney is a believer in small starts. He was a struggling actor the wrong side of 30 before he hit the big time as Dr Doug Ross in ER. “I was unfamous for an awfully long time,” as he puts it.
Now indisputably in the big league, he’s trying not to let it go to his head. “The problem with famous people is they start to think, ‘I’m famous because I earned it.’ The truth is, they got lucky.
“My aunt, Rosemary Clooney [the late American singer], was a big star in the 1950s, but by 1955 she was gone. She was just 24 years old and all washed up.
“She did not become less of a singer in those years. But she didn’t understand it, so became a nut for 20 years, took every drug known to man and had nervous breakdowns until she finally got her act together. So if my confidence is based only on how a film will do at the box office, then I’m in trouble.”
Fortunately Clooney retains a healthy line in self-deprecating humour, is a notorious practical joker with a close circle of friends and remains, 15 years after the demise of his brief first marriage, the most eligible bachelor in Hollywood. Nicole Kidman and Michelle Pfeiffer once famously bet him $10,000 a piece that he would be married with children by the time he was 40. They honoured the wager, both sending cheques in the post on the actor’s 40th birthday. Clooney sent the cheques back, offering them double or nothing that he would still be single at 50.
For a while, Lisa Snowdon, a British model, shared the seat of one of a string of Harley-Davidsons. Then, most recently, Sarah Larson, 29, a reality TV contestant and cocktail waitress, was in the hot seat. Clooney managed to keep that relationship under wraps until he crashed a Harley in New Jersey last September, earning them both a real-life trip to ER. Clooney escaped with a fractured rib; Larson with two broken toes. For a while there was speculation that the accident might have brought the couple closer together. But no. Larson moved out of Clooney’s Los Angeles pad a couple of months ago, and in interviews he still reserves his most tender eulogies for Max, his Vietnamese potbellied pig, which died in 2006.
Right now he’s eagerly awaiting the arrival of his next electric dream machine. With the delivery of his Tesla Roadster, scheduled for later this year, he will finally have an electric car worthy of People magazine’s Sexiest Man Alive, 1997 and 2006. The Tesla, built in California by Tesla Motors, has the streamlined looks of a supercar. Clooney “can hardly wait”. “They’re like Ferraris,” he says. “It’s going to make less of a dent on my pride [than the Tango].”
He’ll even have room for a passenger. “I can make friends again,” he says with a smile. And break a few more hearts, hey George?
MY STUFF…
ON MY CD CHANGER
Anything byT Bone Burnett. He produced the score for O Brother, Where Art Thou?, the Coen brothers’ movie in 2000 [which starred Clooney as one of a trio of escaped convicts in 1930s America].
The soundtrack went on to win three Grammy awards, including the one for best album. Burnett was also the guy to convince me that I could not sing on the soundtrack, so maybe I owe him one. I also like country music generally – I am a Kentucky boy, after all
ON MY DVD PLAYER
My favourite movies are all between 1964 and 1976. They did not always end in a comfortable way. But it’s hard to beatThe Verdict(1982). And anything, from the past, with James Stewart
I WOULD NEVER THROW AWAY
Pictures of Max, my dearly departed potbellied pig. You can’t replace a good pig Born in Kentucky in 1961, George Clooney is the son of a former beauty queen and a TV anchorman. When he failed to make the Cincinnati Reds baseball team he turned to acting, his break coming in 1994 with ER, the hospital television drama. He went on to star in films such as Ocean’s Eleven and Michael Clayton. He was married to the actress Talia Balsam, but is now single
Source: LINK
George will get another pet.. maybe a goat?
January 26, 2007 by admin
Filed under Family, Friends and Co-Stars
GEORGE Clooney is not going to replace his pet pig Max. The silver fox was devastated when his porcine pal died last month and shocked when he was inundated with replacement porkers. George, 45, said: “Max was irreplaceable, but I’ll get another pet, maybe a goat. I’ve found homes for the pigs I was sent.” (Daily Star)
CLOONEY EASES GRIEF WITH TUSCAN TREATS
GEORGE CLOONEY is reportedly planning to buy a second home in Italy in a bid to recover from the death of his beloved pet pig MAX. The Hollywood heartthrob has treated himself to a beautiful Tuscan villa to take his mind of the death of his 19-year-old Pot bellied pig. A friend tells British Newspaper The Observer, “George has been practicing because the death of the pig leaves room in his life to try dating seriously again. “And what better babe magnet is there in the world than a Tuscan villa.” Clooney has owned a home on the shores of Lake Como, northern Italy, for many years’ (Contact Music)
Nick Clooney’s Column: Moment of Silence for Max
December 11, 2006 by admin
Filed under Family, Friends and Co-Stars
Nick pays a lovely tribute to Max in his latest column titled “Moment of silence for Max“
This was going to be quite a travelogue, but that will have to wait for another day.
Max upstaged everything.
Here were Nina and I criss-crossing the country, doing a little work in California, seeing old friends, attending the premiere of George’s new movie, then back to Washington to complete our TV special on Darfur before heading to Chicago for a speech. Heck, Max would have rated no more than a line or two. Now, he’s the lead story because he went and died. I wish he hadn’t done that.
Some of you read about it or saw it on TV. Other than cartoon characters or featured movie players, Max must have been the best-known pig in America. George says Max was in his 19th year, and the two of them had been friends all that time. Often, in interviews, George would call it his “longest-lasting relationship.”
Let me make clear that Max was no cartoon character. Though he started life as a cute little porker, he grew to be a full-sized boar with a distinct personality. Like every friend you and I have, he had his quirks. He could be loud. In fact, he could go from a grunt to a shrill squeal and back again at every volume level imaginable.
While this had a downside if it happened in the middle of a dinner conversation, it also had an upside. Max was the greatest watch-pig in California. No one set foot on the property at any hour of the day or night without Max raising a ruckus.
In recent years, he had his own little house and a small yard about halfway down a steep driveway. Every daybreak, he would walk up the hill and squeal good morning. He would try the door to the house to see if anyone had been foolish enough to leave it slightly unlatched. If they did, he would push it open, stroll around the downstairs rooms before settling down on a favorite rug in the hallway until someone came downstairs to join him.
If the door was locked, he would simply stretch out across the threshold, obliterating the welcome mat. No one could go in or out without stepping over Max, no easy task.
When Max died, the veterinarian said he was the oldest pig of that size he had ever treated. He recalled one that had reached 15, but most had a life span of about 12. Those extra years can probably be attributed to George and his assistant Angel, who decided a few years ago to put Max on a diet. He had gotten as fat as a … well, you know. He was somewhere in the 300-pound range. The strict diet took as much as 100 pounds off that total, leaving Max relatively svelte and active in his mature years.
On one occasion, Max might have been a literal lifesaver. It was the mid-1990s and George was in a different house on one of the sharp L.A. hills. In those days, Max spent a great deal of time in the house and often slept at the foot of George’s bed.
Early one morning, Max began his famous squealing, waking George from a sound sleep and sending him on a search around the house. He found nothing and, irritated, scolded Max. At that moment, the Northridge earthquake hit, jolting the house off its foundation and, incidentally, hurling a large TV set off its stand and onto a pillow where George’s head had been moments before. So that legend about animals getting advance vibes on such events is true.
But it is also true that pigs have unusual intelligence, as we have been told? Nina says yes. She was visiting George not long after Max had come to live with him. George had an early call and Nina was alone with Max, who came squealing to her as she had coffee. She ignored him. Bad choice. Max squealed all the louder, ran out the back door, then came back again and again, squealing all the way. Nina got up and followed him. On the patio, Max circled a wooden trunk, then came back to her. He did that several times. Finally, Nina opened the trunk. Food was there. She fed him and had blessed peace and quiet while she read the paper.
The end came peacefully. George was out of town, but Angel - the most dedicated animal lover of us all - put his blanket over him and turned on a heat lamp against the cool California night. He grunted contentedly. Angel checked regularly all night. In the wee hours, Max slipped away.
He was a great pig, devoted to his friend George. Many good times to remember. Many laughs. Max may have been a boar, but he was never - ever - a bore.
Nick Clooney writes for The Post every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. E-mails sent to Nick at nickclooney@cincypost.com will be forwarded to him via regular mail.
George wants another Pet Pig
December 10, 2006 by admin
Filed under Family, Friends and Co-Stars, Gossip
George Clooney is looking for a pot-bellied piglet to replaced his beloved porker, Max, who died after 18 years of sleeping in George’s luxurious Hollywood bedroom — even when he had company! George got custody of Max after divorcing Kelly Preston and has nursed him through geriatric blindness and arthritis. George says: “I loved him very much; pigs are smart and make wonderful pets. I want another one” (Ottawa Sun)
More Max News…
December 6, 2006 by admin
Filed under Family, Friends and Co-Stars, General Articles
George Clooney Recalls Beloved Pet Pig
By Jed Dreben -People Online
A downcast George Clooney’s eyes welled up with tears at Monday night’s Hollywood premiere of his latest movie, The Good German, when the subject turned to Max, his 300-lb. pet pot-bellied pig who just died. Asked how he was doing in light of the loss of his devoted companion, who had lived with PEOPLE’s Sexiest Man Alive for the past 18 years in his Los Angeles home, Clooney, 45, told PEOPLE: “I’m good. I just got home this morning, or this afternoon, so it’s strange not having him sitting on the carpet in the house, but, you know… sad, actually. Recalling his best memory of Max, who was often featured in interviews with Clooney (who referred to him as “Max, the star”), the two-legged star said, “Oh, there are plenty of them. He got me in a lot of trouble that pig, in general, (and) scared the hell out of a lot of delivery people, too.” Clooney – who had informed USA Today that there would be no successor because, “I think Max covered all my pig needs” – was also overheard at the premiere as saying something about cremation.
GRUNT IN PEACE, THE PIG THAT WON GEORGE’S HEART
BY GORDON RAYNER Source: Daily Mail
AS a major player in the heart-throb league, George Clooney has dallied with a seemingly endless stream of beautiful women. But only now, at the age of 45, has his heart been broken. Not by some screen siren or magazine model, but by the death of Max, his pet Vietnamese potbellied pig. Clooney was so devoted to the 21-stone porker that he once joked he would marry him if he could get him into a wedding dress.
In an interview with the newspaper USA Today, Clooney revealed that he heard the bad news while he was away from home promoting his film The Good German.
‘He was as old a pig as the vets had ever seen,’ he said. ‘I was really surprised, because he’s been a big part of my life. He just died, like an hour ago.
‘It has been a bad year for my pets. I had a bulldog that died this year too. It’s strange how animals become a big part of your family.’
Clooney bought Max for his then girlfriend Kelly Preston 18 years ago. When she left, later to marry John Travolta, the pig stayed.
Max, who had arthritis and was partially blind, would squeal nonstop at Clooney every morning until he was fed. Visitors often had to step over the beast, whose owner referred to him as ‘Max, the star’.
Despite dating the likes of Renee Zellweger, Mariella Frostrup and Lisa Snowdon, Clooney, who was briefly married before he found fame in the TV series ER, has vowed never to give up his bachelor status. His mansion has eight bedrooms - one each for him and his seven best male buddies - and he says he likes nothing better than drinking Guinness, playing darts and watching TV with them.
In 1996 there were rumours that he was about to marry French law student Celine Balitran, whom he met when she was a waitress serving him drinks in a Paris bar, but Max was said to have come between them after Clooney refused to keep the pig outside.
Clooney’s only concession was to suggest banning Max from the bedroom and swimming pool, but this was not enough for Miss Balitran, who left.
Last year Clooney was infuriated by media reports which mistakenly said Max had died, and said at the time: ‘It’s him I’ve had the longest relationship of my life with.’
He even credited the pig with saving his life by waking him up before an earthquake. He said: ‘About three minutes before, Max woke me up and kept nudging me, like he was trying to warn me. That’s how smart he is.’ Two years ago, after he split from actress Krista Allen, he joked to friends that if he could get Max into a wedding dress he would marry him ‘because that way people might stop going on at me about settling down’.
Clooney has no plans to replace his exotic pet, saying: ‘I think Max covered all my pig needs.’
551 words
5 December 2006
Daily Mail
11
English
(c) 2006 Associated Newspapers. All rights reserved
GEORGE AND MAX
Andrew Gumbel Source: The Independent
WORLD | A LOVE STORY MADE IN HOLLYWOOD One is the sexiest man in movies. The other is a 300lb pot-bellied pig. Andrew Gumbel reports on a beautiful relationship and its tragic end.
This is the story of a love affair between a heartthrob Hollywood movie star and his 300lb Vietnamese pot-bellied pig.
The two of them shared quite a history. Clooney first bought Max 18 years ago for his girlfriend at the time, the actress Kelly Preston. When their relationship broke up – she went on to marry John Travolta – she left the pig behind. Since then, Max has been Clooney’s most faithful companion, and an irresistible talking point for friends and journalists who have had to step over the beast blocking the threshold of Clooney’s Tudor mansion above Laurel Canyon.
Max had already defied the odds by surviving to the age of 19. He was partially blind and suffered from arthritis. So the end was not completely unexpected, even if Clooney was not exactly nursing him at his bedside. Clooney is altogether much too suave a character to let us know what kind of emotional impact Max’s death might have had on him, but he did acknowledge that the news caught him off guard.
When a journalist from USA Today caught up with him last Friday, he announced, simply: “He just died, like an hour ago … He was as old a pig as the vets have ever seen. I was really surprised, because he’s been a big part of my life.”
It took a few days for the news to trickle out, not least because the only thing the entertainment press wanted to talk about over the weekend was the limoncello bender. (For the scoop on The Good German, we might now just have to wait for its official US release later this month.) To judge by the belated rush of reaction, it’s going to take a while to get this pig out of the collective media system.
Already the craziest George-and-Max stories have started circulating. It is said that the pig is the reason Clooney has never married, that the pig actually slept with Clooney, that the pig made the tantrums and hissy fits and absurd on-set demands of Clooney’s co-stars, directors and publicists seem trivial by comparison.
History will doubtless one day record where Max and George really stand on the scale of celebrity eccentricity. It’s worth remembering that Clooney is hardly the first prominent entertainer with an unusual choice of pet. Elvis had a monkey called Scatter who died of cirrhosis of the liver. Michael Jackson had a chimpanzee called Bubbles. Just this week, the self-consciously weird cult director David Lynch was seen sitting on a street corner in Hollywood with a pet cow, a poster for his new movie, Inland Empire, and a sign that read: “Without cows there would be no cheese in the Inland Empire.” For the record, it seems safe to say that Max had not slept in Clooney’s bed for some time. As Clooney himself put it: “You get a lot of grief from people when you sleep with a pig.” As for the link between bachelorhood and his pig, it is true that Max has at times been one of those relationship deal-breakers.
“I’ve had different reactions over the years,” Clooney once said. “But I always say, ‘Love me, love my pig.’ What can I do?”
Perhaps the most reliable take on Max the pig comes to us from George’s journalist father, Nick Clooney, who wrote about him a while back in his column in the Cincinnati Inquirer. Evidently, when Clooney first bought him, he was a cute little thing you could cradle in your arms. “Those who fostered the adoption,” Clooney Sr wrote, “neglected to tell George that Max would one day be the size of a linebacker with an appetite to match.” Contrary to the wilder stories in circulation, it seems Max spent most of his time in a little pig shelter 100ft down the driveway from the main house. He also had a spot reserved for him in the garage – his “vacation home” – which was much closer to the front door.
“When Max is hungry,” Clooney wrote, “he lumbers over to the front door and lies down lengthwise over the welcome mat, completely blocking the entrance. He then grunts and squeals until someone brings him breakfast. George has not required an alarm clock for 17 years.” Naturally, a squealing 300lb black pig with a ravenous appetite is going to get you some attention, which is why Max has been a steady feature of Clooney’s media coverage for years.
Max was famous enough in his own right, in fact, to generate a hoax story of his death at the beginning of last year. Clooney himself hasn’t been shy to discuss his pet’s character defects. “He’s eating his way through life,” he cheerily admitted in one interview. “I’d put him on a diet, but he screams like hell if he’s not able to stuff himself the way he likes it.” Occasionally, all that squealing can come in handy, like the early morning hours of 16 January 1994, when the Northridge earthquake shook most of Los Angeles, prompting shortlived but very real fears that the Big One had struck.
As Clooney recounted it: “Max was in bed with me and woke up minutes before it happened. And I was yelling at him for waking me up, when everything just exploded. So, I’m naked with Max, and running … because I’m in a house on a hill, and if it’s going down I want to be up on the street, dodging the next house.
“My buddy, who lives in the downstairs guesthouse, comes running up. And he’s naked. With a gun, because he thought someone was breaking in. And I’m trying to write a note to my folks, trying to explain to them in case we die that it’s not what is seems: two naked men, a gun and a pig.” Max himself almost died in 2001 when a friend of Clooney’s, Tommy Hinkley, accidentally ran him over. Hinkley later recounted: “Max is a black pig and it was dark. It seems like it’s funny now but at the time it certainly was-n’t. We thought he might have lost his leg … Thank God George and I are best friends. I think he has forgiven me but he was upset at the time.”
Clooney has had other pets over the years, most notably a pair of French bulldogs he named Bud and Lou, after the old comedy duo Abbott and Costello They too were a gift from Clooney to a girlfriend, his onetime French fiancée Celine Balitran. Like Max, they stayed behind even after the relationship came to an end. Bud died earlier this year. “It’s been a bad year for my pets,” Clooney told USA Today. “It’s strange how animals become a big part of your family. They really become a big issue with you.” The reporter asked Clooney if he might consider getting another pig. “No,” Clooney replied. “I think Max covered all my pig needs.”
1630 words
6 December 2006
The Independent
1ST
28,29
English
(c) 2006 Independent & Media PLC
George confirms Max has passed away.
December 3, 2006 by admin
Filed under Family, Friends and Co-Stars, General Articles
Clooney: A true friend to the piggish
Clooney on Max: “He’sbeen a big part of my life.”
NEW YORK By Susan Wloszczyna, USA TODAY
Max has gone to hog heaven. The nearly 300-pound potbellied pig who shared George Clooney’s Hollywood Hills home, and sometimes his bed, died Friday while his owner was out of town promoting his latest film, The Good German, due Dec. 15. “He just died, like an hour ago,” says the actor, who gained custody of the porker about 18 years ago, after breaking up with live-in girlfriend Kelly Preston (now Mrs. John Travolta). “He was as old a pig as the vets had ever seen. I was really surprised, because he’s been a big part of my life.”
The source of what the dedicated bachelor often declared as his longest-running relationship, Max frequently made cameos in interviews, mostly because visitors had to step over the huge animal before entering Clooney’s house. “Max, the star,” Clooney says, a bit wistfully. The pig was famous enough to make headlines after being declared prematurely dead in January 2005. The actor issued a denial.
A grunting alarm clock with a massive appetite who would squeal every morning until he was fed, Max had arthritis and was partly blind. He was seriously injured in 2001 when one of Clooney’s friends ran him over while he trotted outside in the dark. His love of his master apparently was enough to keep him ticking. Until now. “It has been a bad year for my pets,” Clooney says. “I had a bulldog that died this year, too. It’s strange how animals become a bit part of your family. They really become a big issue with you.” Will he get another pig? “No,” he says. “I think Max covered all my pig needs.”
.jpg)
Burn After Reading
The Fantastic Mr. Fox
Men Who Stare at Goats
Up in The Air